Good news for chocolate lovers and chocoholics!
"They say traditional chocolate production, using only the beans, involves leaving the rest of the cocoa fruit – the size of a pumpkin and full of nutritious value - to rot in the fields.
The key to the new chocolate lies in its very sweet juice ...
This juice, which is 14% sugar, is distilled down to form a highly concentrated syrup, combined with the pulp and then, taking sustainability to new levels, mixed with the dried husk, or endocarp, to form a very sweet cocoa gel.
The gel, when added to the cocoa beans to make chocolate, eliminates the need for refined sugar. ..."
"In brief
- ... researchers have developed a type of chocolate that is more sustainable and nutritious than conventional varieties.
- Cocoa-fruit chocolate uses cocoa fruit jelly as a replacement for powdered sugar, reducing the sugar content and increasing the product’s nutritional value.
- This new chocolate recipe also has the potential to diversify the income sources of small farmers.
..."
From the abstract:
"Chocolate production faces nutritional, environmental and socio-economic challenges present in the conventional cocoa value chain. Here we developed an approach that addresses these challenges by repurposing the often-discarded pectin-rich cocoa pod endocarp and converting it into a gel. This is done using cocoa pulp juice concentrate to replace traditional sugar from sugar beets. Although swelling of fibres, proteins and starches can limit gel incorporation, our proposed chocolate formulation contains up to 20 wt% gel. It also has comparable sweet taste as traditional chocolate while offering improved nutritional value with higher fibre and reduced saturated fatty acid content. A cradle-to-factory life cycle assessment shows that large-scale production of this chocolate could reduce land use and global warming potential compared with average European dark chocolate production. The process also provides opportunities for diversification of farmers’ income and technology transfer, offering potential socio-economic benefits for cocoa-producing regions."
Chocolate that harnesses the full potential of the cocoa fruit "Researchers at ETH Zurich have teamed up with the food industry to produce a whole-fruit variety of chocolate. This helps increase the value creation of cocoa farming – and is healthier."
Valorization of cocoa pod side streams improves nutritional and sustainability aspects of chocolate (open access)
Credits: Human Progress weekly newsletter
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